I'm about to just give up on homebrewing.

I'm running a Brewzilla Gen 4, Fermzilla All Rounder, 2 tap kegerator... and all I do is buy kits off of MoreBeer and Norhern Berwer and every single one of them comes out completely wrong.

I literally just did a simple Pale Ale from MoreBeer and literally missed my preboil gravity by 20 points (target preboil of 1.049... I hit 1.020".

I'm done. I'm ready to just start giving away my gear and just buying local craft brewery kegs for my kegerator. I literally have not made a single drinkable beer in over 2 years of trying... and I do EVERYTHING by the book.

I'm not ready to keg yet, but I also wasn't happy with using a bottling bucket and priming sugar for carbonation, so I took an intermediate step. Found a guy selling 11 pallets of kegs for $20 each and got two of them that had carbonation stones.

So I did a closed transfer from my Fermzilla to the keg, and set it up for forced carbonation at 30psi (10 for the stone, 18 from a chart based on beer style and temperature, and another 2 just because). However, it was still carbonating after several hours, and I just stopped because I was afraid of over carbonating the beer.

But the main part of this post was to talk about the lever-operated counter pressure bottlers showing up on Amazon. I'd had mine in my list for months, and when I went to buy it the price jumped 15%. That pretty much sucked, and it wasn't noticeable BEFORE it went in the cart. I've had this issue with stuff I've purchased from Amazon before. As it was, it was 50% of the price of a Boel device or clone.

https://imgur.com/a/uI3NpJ6

This device has 4 ports, and no instructions in english. Communications with the sellers didn't help, I had to figure it out. Basically, gas goes in the left upper port, beer in the right. The lower left port is for purging the bottle, the lower right port when cracked gets the beer flowing.

A few things this device needs:

1. a backlight so you can better see where the beer is in the neck. I'll probably 3d print a mount for some Amazon light.
2. a collection jar with a mount to the back to catch the foam. Probably will 3D print that as well.
3. a drip tray to mount it to - there's a lot of drippage
4. a means to clamp it down. If you have a big enough drip tray it might work without a clamp, but actuating the lever over-centers the device and tips it over.
5. a hose to go from the nipple under the seal to the bottom of your bottles.

Other improvements:

1. re-designing the linkage so that you can pull the lever from the front
2. more common line sizes - all of the lines are 5/16 ID, nearly 1/2" OD. Could not find adapters at Home Depot, our local hardware store, or even McMaster Carr, so I made some by putting 1/4" compression sleeves inside my 5/16 lines, stuffing those into the 1/2" lines and hose clamping them. Worked fine, no leaks.
3. instead of the compression connections at the machine for beer and gas, ball locks would have been much easier. And for some reason, they used a duotite fitting instead of a compression on the gas bleed line. if those compression adapters are 1/4 NPT on the machine side this will be an easy fix (but another $20)

Setup requires adjusting the upper clamp bolt (where the lever attaches at the top) to put enough spring pressure on the silicone seal when it sits on the bottle such that it won't lift at the pressure you are bottling at. This takes a bit of trial and error. I started at 20 PSI. Then you adjust the bottom clamp that the mechanism rests on when there's no bottle in it.

To use it you:

1. lift the mechanism with the lever and place a bottle under the seal, and release the lever.
2. Turn the handle to the left. Gas will enter the bottle
3. turn the bleed screw to vent the gas out of the bottle; then close the bleed screw.
4. turn the handle to the right. Beer might start flowing slowly, if not, crack the liquid knob on the right. It doesn't take much to really get it going. It is much faster than a bucket wand filler. Close the knob when the beer is just below where you want it, then return the handle to the center position.
5. vent the pressure and foam in the bottle using the bleed screw again.
6. wrap a towel around the top of the neck and lift the seal with the lever. Tilt the bottom of the bottle towards you and pull it out. Cap as usual.

It takes between 1.5-2 minutes per bottle, including the time it takes to remove several bottles from the fridge, filling, and capping.

So the biggest downside is that the fill level is inconsistent. Sometimes I got a lot of foam and had to push it out, sometimes I didn't. Sometimes when I'd remove the bottle I'd get a lot more foam, sometimes I didn't. As a result my bottles go from filled just at the bottom of the neck to within 1/4" of the top. I really don't have a handle on what the proper keg pressure and pressure to run the device ought to be.

If anyone in the area want to compare notes, or maybe even meet for a brew or taste test etc....

Friends,

My son and I with our wives went to Belgium specifically to drink beer. We both like Belgian Beers and wanted to try as many as we could. And that we did for two weeks.

We brew beers and have a great Westvleteren 12 Clone that we bottle condition. We would like to brew Westmalle Triple and La Chouffe Blonde. Can you recommend some great Clone Recipes for these two. We brew all grain and we plan to keg these in 10 gallon kegs

How do I make sure that my wine won't start fermenting again after back-sweetening it, without using any chemicals?

If I set my spunding valve to 1 psi, is that effectively working as an airlock for ales ?

I've read that dry yeast doesn't require a starter, and that there is actually some hinderance to it's properties should you decide to do it. So I did it.

Here's what I found:

I made a DME wort with a typical starter gravity. I pitched one packet of dry yeast into it and let it go for about eight hours. At which point I put my flask in the fridge, then a day later decanted it and put my "starter" yeast into a Ball jar.

Today I brought it out of the fridge, decanted again and let it sit out and come up to room temperature throughout a 75 minute boil. I had to burp the jar.

I pitched the yeast into five gallons of wort and saw almost immediate activity. I'm down to 1.047 from 1.060, at about six hours from pitch.

I've never seen this fast a rate of fermentation. I'm considering using this as a method of "rehydration" going forward.

Any thoughts? Have I destroyed five gallons of saison?

Buddy has this old keg. I want to be able to put a tri clamp on it to turn it into a fermenter but I can't figure out how to get the existing connector off.

Google is not. The triangle makes it look a bit like a G system but the bolt throws me off. After unscrewing a bit it just rotates without any further loosening. Any ideas?

Photos attached.

https://imgur.com/a/UG07kvB

Hey folks, quick question for you amateur and professional yeast scientists -

I rarely bother reusing yeast, but have recently run into the problem of my favorite saison yeast (WLP-066) having nearly doubling in price from when I first bought it like 10 years ago (those purepitch packets seem so pricey these days!). Tried and failed to find a suitable replacement so I finally bought it again.

I've made an oversized starter for my batch currently boiling, with the thought of saving a portion for 3-6 months until I brew this recipe again. I've never saved yeast for more than a month or two; any recommendations? Would a loosely closed mason jar in the fridge be sufficient? Should I make an additional small starter in a few months to maintain viability? If it all fails, not a huge deal, but I'd like to try something.

I was just trying to open a bottle of a recent batch of home brew, when I did it exploded on me. Losing almost the entire bottle, I went to a second bottle (from the same batch) and the same thing happened again, this time I was ready and opened it over the sink I didn’t lose as much this time plus I opened it a little slower. Could I have over carbonated the batch? I Used Brewers’ Best Carbonation Drops, it says 1 drop per 12 oz bottle which is what I used. I’m wondering if that may actually be too much in the end.

I want to avoid a repeat on the batch I’m about to bottle.

After 14 days fermenting (California Red Ale) I took a sample. It was at 1.020, down from 1.060 when I pitched the yeast (US-05). Monday will be day 21 and there is still activity going on. The airlock bubbles once every minute. Should I bottle on Monday or wait until the bubbles stop? Would priming and bottling in a couple of days result in exploding bottles?

Looking to see if i need to make any adjustments with my tap water….. usually just run it through a carbon filter….. my local water company has a brewers water profile Wish i could add a pic..

Free chlorine - 0.72 Magnesium- 5.6 Calcium- 3.8 Sulfate - 3.0 Chloride- 3.0 Sodium- 5.6 All are in ppm… in in pnw

Hi Gang,

We have recently bought and end of garden building which will be used for my office and home brewery. Inside the space is a 2m x 1.5m room which will be for brewing and the storing of equipment.

I am currently designing the setup of windows, power, lighting, plumbing and more importantly ventilation.

My current plan is in the space will be a 1m wide by 500mm tilt and turn window and cooker hood, thay will shift the steam outta the room. By then I plan to have a 50l setup with a 2.4kw element. But im worried this is not enough and I should maybe plan for more.

Am I being daft or should I scale up my plan ?

This is the sort of low profile cooker hood i am looking at -》 https://www.diy.com/departments/cooke-lewis-clvhs60a-stainless-steel-inset-cooker-hood-w-60cm-grey/3663602429463_BQ.prd

All advice welcome

Just after a bit of advice. I’m brewing mead for the first time and was curious when it starts to ferment as 24 hours in I’m not seeing anything and also the first place I kept it was to cold (14.c) would my yeast survive or do I need to add fresh yeast in the new warmer place?

Thanks for any advice you can provide.

I got an LG TV NanoCell (2022) that I’d like to utilise more, and maybe gain access to apps that are normally unavailable.

Is it worth it, is it not?

What are the advantages?